On Friday evening at Ranchi, with the temperature dipping enough to warrant a small crowd to zip up their jackets, Tilak Varma ran his hands through his ruffled hair that’s coiffured by the hair stylist Aalim Hakim, picked up a ball from the ground, and bowled his off breaks for quite some time. He then had a short chat with the batting coach Sitanshu Kotak as he donned his pads and went in for a batting stint.


The same routine followed on Saturday afternoon, an optional nets day where he was joined by captain KL Rahul, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Ravindra Jadeja and Dhruv Jurel. Tilak was all around the nets, chatting with Kotak or the local spinners, or with his teammates like Jaiswal.


At one stage, on Saturday, two of India’s support staff members whispered something to him, and soon he was whisked away by the broadcasters to the other side of the ground, where he gave a long-ish interview to them. It remains to be seen if he plays the ODI, but there are a couple of slots open from the last ODI team of India seen in Australia.